


when love met death

by yolofaber



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Iwaizumi is literally the angel of death so go figure, M/M, Mentions of Death, Mentions of Suicide, also some violence and broken hearts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-03 20:42:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,578
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24621808
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yolofaber/pseuds/yolofaber
Summary: Oikawa's sole purpose in life is to spread love with his arrows. He's the angel of love, immortal, bound to be alone. His only companion is the angel of death, Iwaizumi. So he makes sure to meet him as often as possible.
Relationships: Iwaizumi Hajime/Oikawa Tooru
Comments: 2
Kudos: 31





	when love met death

Oikawa frowned as he turned around himself, taking in the view. It was valentines day, so many couples were walking around that day, seemingly in love, a lot of girls, giggling as they talked excitedly to their friends about their dates, men in business suits, who got last minute bouquets and pralines for their loved ones. He should have been happy, valentines day was the day of love and romance. At least in theory. 

Oikawa didn’t like Valentines day though. He remembered the times back in Rome, when it was actually Valentine who got young star crossed lovers to be with each other by marrying them in secret. Those were the days. He grinned to himself. Valentine had been a true romantic and if he could have seen valentines day today, he would have been just as disgusted as Oikawa. 

One thing that annoyed Oikawa was, that people on Valentines day often weren’t in love. The people who bought these last minute presents got them out of a sense of responsibility or even pity, seldomly out of love. He looked at one young couple, the boy was head over heels for the girl beside him, it was obvious, even for people who didn’t have Oikawa’s instincts. The girl on the other hand, looked bored, even uncomfortable, concentrating on the showcases of the stores, instead of the boy, refusing to hold his hand. Oikawa nearly felt guilty, one sided attraction, just like any other form of love was his responsibility. The happiness that resulted from a beautiful relationship was his merit just as much as the many, many broken hearts that were inevitable when he only struck one person with an arrow. 

The other thing that annoyed him about valentine's day was the boredom. Oikawa didn’t have anything to do on this day in february, because people didn’t fall in love that day. A lot of them fell out of love, though. People didn’t fall in love on valentine's day. They fell in love on brisk spring days, warm summer nights, snowy winter mornings and lazy autumn afternoons, but not today.

He should have been happy. Love doesn’t usually get a break. It just happens where ever, whenever, so valentine's day was the one day in a year when Oikawa at least kind of got to have a pause. But he wasn’t used to it, it made him antsy, as though he had forgotten something. 

“Can’t say I’m surprised seeing you here.” A deep voice pulled him out of his thoughts, causing Oikawa to turn around. In front of him stood a man, slightly smaller than him, though his overpowering presence made up for what he missed in height. There was something dark about him in every sense of the word, not surprising, after all, the man in front of Oikawa, his complete opposite, was an angel of death.

Oikawa forced a grin on his face. “Iwa-can! What are you doing here? Don’t tell me you want to go reaping souls on this beautiful day?” 

The man in front of him grunted. “Don’t act so innocent, Cupido,” he spitted out the name as though it was an insult, “you know why I’m here.”

Time seemed to slow down as Oikawa followed Iwaizumi’s eyes to the opposite street where a couple was waiting to cross the road on a streetlight. They were in love. It was for real, a pure, overpowering love between them, the kind of love one only feels once in a lifetime. The man was planning on proposing today. The angel of love knew it had taken him weeks to decide on the perfect engagement ring, the perfect day and place to propose. He wanted everything for the love of his live to be perfect.

He sighed, looking at the angel of death next to him. “Do you really have to do it today though? It is the day of love, after all, just let him propose to her, first.” 

Iwaizumi didn’t seem too happy about it either. “As if you cared about valentine’s day,” he scoffed, “it was your arrow after all, that decided how it would end.” He looked at the couple instead of Oikawa. “You know I just collect the souls. I can’t interfere with fate, though.” 

“Oh well, that’s just how life is, then…” Oikawa grinned cheekily. “Love doesn’t always have a happy end.”

Iwaizumi’s expression darkened even more. “Sometimes you’re cruel, even for a cupido.” 

Time started going faster again, until it reached its original pace. A car came racing down the streets, trying to brake, as it reached the red lights, but the streets were icy on this cold day and the car started swirling instead of stopping. It happened too fast for the man to process what was happening as his girlfriend got hit by the car, turning what should have been the happiest day of his life into the beginning of years of grief. 

“That’s my cue.” When Oikawa turned around, the reaper was already gone, now at the place of the accident, carefully picking up the soul of the dead woman. 

The man was on his knees trying to help his girlfriend, not realising, she was already gone. “Sometimes love is just cruel like that,” Oikawa whispered to himself, already not thinking about the poor man anymore, thinking of Iwaizumi instead, the angel of death, the one being he could never shoot with his arrow.

\---

Being immortal meant being lonely. There were enough books and movies about this topic, usually ending with the immortal somehow falling in love anyways, in some way or another either turning their lover immortal or giving up their immortality to be with the one they loved. 

That wasn’t how it worked, though, and that was why Oikawa, the Angel of love himself was lonely, his only companion, death, even busier than himself. 

It wasn’t like eternity was all bad, it was mostly fascinating, seeing humans evolve, seeing everything change, while love always stayed the same. There were many good moments, too many to be overpowered by the loneliness, still Oikawa never felt quite as good as he did, when he got to met Iwaizumi once in a while.

\---

  
  


“You can’t leave me just like that!”

“You’re a monster, I hate you! Just let me leave already!”

Oikawa had no idea if this was love. He knew he had probably shot this couple at some point, but he didn’t remember the kind of arrows he used. The man sure _thought_ he was in love, the woman sure _used to_ be in love, but right now, even he couldn't figure out what this was. Love and hate weren’t all that different and the borders between them were rarely clearly defined. Maybe that’s why it was fascinating enough for him to linger and observe. Maybe that’s why he stayed long enough to meet Iwaizumi when he arrived. 

“That one’s cruel, even for you.” 

Oikawa shrugged. “It happens every day, I don’t know why it still shocks you.” 

The woman turned around to leave out of the door so she didn’t see her husband getting the gun out of a drawer. He shot her before she could even realise she was in danger.

“You know, I don’t think we’re all that different.” Oikawa told Iwaizumi. “People think of both of us the wrong way. They believe me to be the good guy and you to be the bad one, taking away their loved ones.”

The man came closer to his bleeding wife, freezing, as he realised what he had done. 

“But really they don’t know it’s you who’s just comforting the dead as they leave this world, you make death comfortable. People don’t realise that you’re the good guy in this story.” 

Oikawa paused as he nocked his arrow and aimed for the man. The arrow shot him, filling this man with pure, unaltered love, just as his wife took her final breath. 

It didn’t matter if he had loved her before or not. Now, that it was too late, he did and it was enough to make him go crazy. The man lifted the gun to his own head. 

“You’re the good guy,” Oikawa continued as the second gunshot echoed through the streets, “and I’m the bad one.” 

\---

Falling for Iwaizumi was inevitable. There was no other being that knew Oikawa like the angel of death did, no one, who had been there as long as him, no one else who _understood._

\---

“I thought about what you said.” 

They were in a hospital room, the shrill beeps of the machines and the sterile smell felt somehow comforting. 

“About me being the good guy and you being the bad one,” Iwaizumi explained, answering Oikawa's questioning look. “I don’t think it’s that easy and I think we’re both too old to still believe the world can be divided into black and white, good and evil.”

The nurses had pushed the two beds together, so the couple, an old man and an old woman, could lie next to each other. They were both asleep, nearly gone already, but holding hands, still. Oikawa's arrow had hit them many decades ago, when they had met as children, they gotten married later, raised kids with each other. They had gotten old with each other. 

“How long did they have?” The angel of death asked Oikawa. 

“Their whole lives.” He smiled. This was what happened when love was pure and beautiful, when the right arrows shot the right people at the right time. 

“I’ve carried too many desperate souls away, souls that weren’t ready to go, to believe my work is always good. I’ve met you too often to believe love is always nice.” Iwaizumi gestured towards the couple. “But sometimes, both of us, love and death come with perfect timing. And then I almost believe, we’re good.” 

“You think I’m nice,” Oikawa teased, destroying the peaceful atmosphere between them. But Iwaizumi's reaction was a sight he would never forget. He, the angel of death, was blushing. 

“I told you, you _can_ be nice and now shut up. I need to work.”

The souls of the old couple were bright. They were ready for whatever came next. Oikawa had given them everything they needed in this life and Iwaizumi would do his best to make their transition as comfortable as possible.

\---

Where’s love, there’s life. Where’s life, there’s death. It was easy as that. 

Oikawa didn’t remember a time when he hadn’t been cupido, he didn’t remember anyone else than Iwaizumi being the angel of death. He had had multiple lovers during the thousands of years that he had lived. Why not? After all it was easy to him: One arrow and the person he desired was his, for as long as he liked. 

But being immortal meant being left alive as these lovers got picked up by the angel of death and after years and years, Oikawa had come to realise that Iwaizumi was the only constant in his life. 

He had been there in the beginning and he would be there at the end. 

“Will you pick me up like that, one day too?” 

Iwaizumi next to him shrugged. “Probably. I don’t know.” 

“I can’t shoot you, you know? My aim is perfect, my arrows always find their target, but with you, it’s different. They always disappear before they get to you.” 

The angel of death didn’t seem surprised by that statement. “I’m not human after all.” 

“And that makes me wonder,” Oikawa closed his eyes in thought, “if I can’t shoot you, maybe you can’t carry me away.” 

Iwaizumi understood. “You’re immortal after all.”

“Nothing stays forever.” Oikawa looked into his dark eyes, got lost in the darkness. “But when it’s over, I’d like to hope, you’ll be the one carrying me.” 

It was a rare moment, a moment just between them, when the angel of death allowed himself to slow down, to take a break, allowed himself to talk to Oikawa. 

“I’ll try my best to fulfill your wish.” With that he was gone again, there were souls, waiting to be picked up by him. 

Oikawa was left with a smile on his face. 

\---

“We can’t keep meeting like this.” Oikawa grinned at Iwaizumi as he arrived. 

“Then you have to stop killing people with your arrows.” 

“Meanie,” Oikawa pouted as they watched the girl looking down to the river flowing under the bridge. “You know I don’t kill them, I just spread love! Some people just don’t know how to handle it!”  
  


“Sure,” Iwaizumi answered sarcastically. 

“And how else am I supposed to meet you, anyways? You’re always so busy.”

“Well unlike love, death can’t take a break.” Iwaizumi said darkly.

It was raining, the weather was truly depressing, fitting for a suicide. The angel of death watched the girl as she slowly got up to the railing of the bridge and Oikawa observed him, looking at the girl. His dark eyes were filled with concern, even though he had done this so many times already. Thousands of years and still, there were things the angel of death never got used to.

“Why are you here?” The dark haired man turned to Oikawa. “She’s young, she doesn’t know where she belongs, feels confused and sad, but I don’t see love in this equation, so why are you here?”

Oikawa smiled slightly. “Maybe to give you a minute off of work?”

Iwaizumi’s eyes widened as he realised what the angel next to him meant. “You can’t interfere with fate like that.”

“Oh Iwa-chan,” he answered teasingly. “ _You_ can’t interfere with fate like that, but love _is_ fate. Never forget that.” The bow and arrow appeared in his hands out of thin air. “I can give her something to live for. 

He shot the arrow towards the girl. The impact nearly made her trip and fall, but she regained her balance and after she did, something in her face had changed: The uncertainty was replaced by a new sense of purpose and she safely got back down from the railing. Another girl came running towards the bridge, screaming the girls name. Another girl, another arrow. Two souls that had found each other. 

Oikawa turned around to the dark figure beside him. “So what are you going to do with your minute of leisure?”

The kiss was unexpected and unlike anything Oikawa had ever experienced. Iwaizumi was tender and determinant at the same time, his lips were soft, only lightly brushing against Oikawa’s at first, before he put more pressure on them, making sure, he would never forget this moment again. 

In a way, Oikawa realised, the kiss was just like death itself. Soft and comforting and at the same time overpowering like nothing he had ever felt before. 

They looked into each others eyes as they broke apart, slightly out of breath. 

“You can’t shoot me with your arrows,” Iwaizumi stated.

“No I can’t.”

“I’m sorry I can’t feel the way you do.” He looked as though he truly meant it and Oikawa couldn’t help but smile.

“It’s not your fault,” he answered, hoping, Iwaizumi believed him.

They smiled at each other sadly, for a moment that felt like forever. 

“One minute’s over,” the angel of death finally whispered. “I need to go, but we’ll meet again.”

“I know,” Oikawa answered, as the angel of death disappeared and the usual grin returned to his face. “I’ll make sure of that.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you liked this, comments are appreciated, especially if there are grammaer/spelling errors I missed!


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